Abstract
Context Continuous integration (CI) is a software engineering technique that proclaims frequent activities to assure the software product health. Researchers and practitioners mention several benefits related to CI. However, no systematic study surveys state of the art regarding such benefits or cons. Objective This study aims to identify and interpret empirical evidence regarding how CI impacts software development. Method Through a Systematic Literature Review, we search for studies in six digital libraries. Starting from 479 studies, we select 101 empirical studies that evaluate CI in the context of software development. We thoroughly read and extract information regarding (i) the CI environment, (ii) findings related to the effects of CI, and (iii) the employed research methods. We apply a thematic synthesis to group and summarize the findings. Results Existing research has explored the positive effects of CI, such as better cooperation, or negative effects, such as adding technical and process challenges. From our thematic synthesis, we identify six themes: development activities, software process, quality assurance, integration patterns, issues & defects, and build patterns. Conclusions Empirical research in CI has been increasing over recent years. We found that much of the existing research reveals that CI brings positive effects to software development. However, CI may also bring technical challenges to software development teams. Despite the overall positive outlook regarding CI, we still find room for improvements in the existing empirical research that evaluates the effects of CI.